This was actually much better than I expected, which perhaps isn’t saying too much! Turned into a fairly standard monster flick, light on topic, high on ‘style’. However, while I did think the hand-held camera was a definite part of the story – and one which worked, imo – it did leave me feeling very nauseous. I watched the video over 4 sessions, pausing each time my head started spinning – not the best recommendation for a movie, alas!

Funny how many bad reviews Cloverfield got here… The handheld camera action didn’t bother me at all – after a little while I hardly noticed it. Maybe that’s because I watched it on my PC at home. For the rest, it’s just a fun/creepy monster movie. It wasn’t too scary or too gory for me, I enjoyed it. I loved seeing all the great shots of NYC, too.

If you watch the DVD, be to sure to catch the “Clover Fun” special feature (bloopers).

I agree with the other comments. This handheld camera crap has got to stop. It’s not cool, it’s not artsy, it’s just plain ANNOYING! As for the storyline, was I supposed to care about any of these people? They were just as annoying as the camera shots.

Oh yeah, the first thing I would do if the Statue of Liberty’s head fell out of the sky… whip out my camera phone and start taking pics. HELL NO! Run Fools Run!

Having failed to see this film at an Odeon theatre in London (my girlfriend became violently sea-sick), I thought the promising beginning of it could be a precursor to how the film would end up. A cool monster-flick, yeay! I was wrong. All in all, the film is almost worse than Spielberg’s take on “War Of The World”. A group of people form in New York, USA, to say good-bye to a friend who’s going away to work in Tokyo, Japan. Everything that is seen is filmed by a participant of the party, who is quite uninteresting as a person, hence in my eyes numbing the film a little. Anyway, as a few of the characters squander to intrigue over who’s hooking up with who, something detonates. People find something otherworldly is tearing up NY. Woo! Sadly, this was the promising bit. Hereafter all is running – with no suspense á la “Alien” whatsoever – or trying to avoid dying, which is boring. I felt little or no sympathy for the characters, and the script felt very thin. All in all, nice special effects but a very dumb film which feels bad, as I think it could have become good with a bit more thought and intelligence.

I thought the filming done in all hand-held, faux-home-video style was awful. If you want to see how hand-held camera can make a movie more exciting, see the Bourne Ultimatum. If you want to see how hand-held camera can make you motion sick, watch this.

The rest of the movie was ok. Not good, not bad, but ok. I can’t wait for the remake in twenty years (haha). The director was betting that the fake-documentary style would make it more exciting. It didn’t. I can’t believe that the Academy of SF and Horror picked this as their SF movie of the year. Surely I am Legend was better, the popcorn-movie Transformers certainly was.

it was for too slow i didn’t watch the whole because nothing was really happening for over 20 minutes.

But in stark contrast, stuff actually happens here. A fun twist on your basic giant monster attack movie.

See this movie in the theatre! I can;t imagine that it would be as interesting or intense on a small screen.

And if the Blair Witch Project was too jumpy for you and made you feel nauseated, this is not the film for you.